Suspension question(drag launch)

[Mike]

Originally Posted by NJ Torque

i too am looking for these answers....

what will get the front wheels to pull off the ground...?

mine pulls them with my setup and a stock motor

[NJ Torque]

thats the best i've gotten with stock springs/struts... with just tubular lca's and a umi tubular stock replacment tq arm.

[Mike]

still have your front sway bar?

[NJ Torque]

Originally Posted by cbrrmike

still have your front sway bar?

yes, as well as stock rear

[MIKES NOTCH]

drop the front sway bar, leave the back one on. u need a strut that will throw the front end up fast and slowly let itself back down. i run all drag suspensions on my mustangs and 90/10 lakewood struts are the best..too bad they dont make em for fbodys. u might find a good adjustable to accomplish wut u want..stock struts suck for drag racing..as soon as the go up the come right back down

[NJ Torque]

yeah, i run 90/10's in my buick... just dont know what people run in an fbody...

[sweetbmxrider]

don't they run qa1's all around? i just think a fully adjustable coilover in the front is your best bet, not sure on the spring weight though

[lilredjeep91]

well going on with what everyone is talking about here i have a question about my set up, i have lakewood 50/50's is rear with tube lcas, stock springs and tq arm and stock up in the front and still have both swap bars, my question is what else could i do to get the best 60 foot and best set up for drag ?

[sweetbmxrider]

whats your 60' and what tires and wheels are you running and psi?

[lilredjeep91]

the last time i went to the track it was a 2.0 60 foot with bold 275/40/17 with 18psi on y2k vette wheels but now i have brand new htr-z 275/40/17 still on the y2k vette wheels but i havent been back to the track yet with the new tires.

[sweetbmxrider]

see what it does in comparison to the old 60' first before throwin parts at it. i am not familiar with those tires so i can't really give any tips there. your best bet is to remove weight off of the front and transfer the weight rearward. adjustable front coilovers will help this. being an m6 though, i would say seat time and launching practice will help your 60' the best.

[NJ Torque]

1.62 60' with MT ET street radials... 275/40/17

[HeadlessNorseman]

Just for the record, 4th gens dont have any struts. tubular LCAs and good bushings will help a lot. The stock ones are quite flimsy. On my monte carlo just welding plates over the stamped LCAs made a huge difference. What is the deal with disconnecting your sway bars? what does that do aside from make your car more dangerous to drive? They dont have any front to back load on them. Adjustable torque arm mount would help too if you can adjust the height at the front. I dont know if such a part exists. The torque arm/lca design is a pretty good design. Lots of weight transfer ability with the right geometry

[Mike]

Originally Posted by isphius

Just for the record, 4th gens dont have any struts. tubular LCAs and good bushings will help a lot. The stock ones are quite flimsy. On my monte carlo just welding plates over the stamped LCAs made a huge difference. What is the deal with disconnecting your sway bars? what does that do aside from make your car more dangerous to drive? They dont have any front to back load on them. Adjustable torque arm mount would help too if you can adjust the height at the front. I dont know if such a part exists. The torque arm/lca design is a pretty good design. Lots of weight transfer ability with the right geometry

yes, they do, struts in the front, shocks in the rear

[Formulalt1]

Originally Posted by Shownomercy

For the 1996 LT1 and 1996 LT4:

LT1 Mass: 785.3 lbs (356.2 kg)
LT4 Mass: 1003.5 lbs (455.2 kg)

For the 2001 LS1 and 2001 LS6:

LS1 Total Dressed Engine Weight: Auto. - 457.6 lbs. (208 kg); Manual - 497.2 lbs (226 kg)
LS6 Total Dressed Engine Weight: (Manual only) - 497.2 lbs (226 kg)

Edit: I don't like those numbers, but bascially a 100* difference LT1/LS1

http://www.lt1engine.com/tech/camaro...f-body-weight/

Edit- Don't know how accurate this is cause I just found this as well http://www.bfranker.badz28.com/fbody/weights.htm .

I do know that a auto LT1 with all accessorys on, in 4 bolt version weighs roughly 565lbs (and the 4 bolt block is slightly heavier than the 2 bolt). Bought a 93 Ybody complete engine and it was put on the scale at the yard before it was loaded into my truck.

[Tru2Chevy]

Originally Posted by isphius

What is the deal with disconnecting your sway bars? what does that do aside from make your car more dangerous to drive? They dont have any front to back load on them.

Disconnecting the front sway bar allows the front suspension to droop down further and / or faster, which will help weight transfer to the rear of the car. Also if you elect to take it off completely it's a few more pounds off the nose of the car which never hurts either

- Justin

[Pampered-Z]

Originally Posted by NJ Torque

i too am looking for these answers....

what will get the front wheels to pull off the ground...?

Lots of RPMs and traction!


Just FYI, you need the rear to squat and stay planted, so you really want the double adjustable shocks to control compression and rebound.

On the front you want the shocks to extend and stay extended/compress slowly. For the rear you want then to compress and come up/rebound slowly.

Basically, compression plants the tires, rebound (or lack of) keeps them planted. On the initial hit the front lift and the rear drops = plants the tires, when the rear shocks rebound ( lift the body back up to original ride hieght ) it needs to be controls or at the top of rebound the inertia works to lift the tires off the surface. If you don't control rebound the car is basically rocking fron to back. So even if you plant the tires at the line after a few feet you start spinning. The air bag in the spring is used to prevent the car twisting side to side which causes the driver's side tire to loose traction. The amount of air is minimal or you are just adding rebound.

If you can adjust your shocks to be firm for street driving you won't notice the sway bar missing. I have the SLP suspension with revalved Blistens and no sway bar, the car handles fine, but I don't do any high speed turns.

[Mike]

Originally Posted by isphius

What is the deal with disconnecting your sway bars? what does that do aside from make your car more dangerous to drive? They dont have any front to back load on them.

Not both, just the front, and unless your taking exits like a f1 driver its not extremely noticeable. i never had any problems driving with no front sway bar either in my current setup or with my old setup lowered with 17s.

Originally Posted by isphius

Adjustable torque arm mount would help too if you can adjust the height at the front. I dont know if such a part exists. The torque arm/lca design is a pretty good design. Lots of weight transfer ability with the right geometry

you don't want to change the height of the front of the tq arm, you use the adjustments in the rear to change the pinion angle of the rear.

[HeadlessNorseman]

Originally Posted by cbrrmike

yes, they do, struts in the front, shocks in the rear

They are just coil over shocks, struts handle the lateral load too. they have an upper control arm for that

so its clear. what shocks (other then switching to QA1s) does everyone reccomend for drag racing

[sweetbmxrider]

fully adjustable....

[MonmouthCtyAntz]

Originally Posted by WildBillyT

As far as I know most of the parts are the same. I know that spring rates are different due to the LT1 being heavier. That is probably why they list it as 93-97.

The part numbers are different but I did some research over on tech about LS1 guys using LT1 springs and vica versa and the stance was perfect...Guess the 30-40 pds doesnt make a huge difference in the spring rate.

[cdubbzz]

For std weight LS1 Fbody
QA1 12 ways all around
300# front springs (I believe stock is 292#)
160-180# rear springs

For LT1 car go with 325# or a lighter car go with 275#

this is assuming you have an aftermarket torque arm and other
common suspension pieces